Threads that bind
by fanficninja205
Summary: In the night's quiet, Lila makes Kell tell her about the unspoken weight, the pain that follows the use of his magic, and together they make a step towards healing, a better life, and a stronger bond. "... I would come to you again and again and again even when the world was ending and there was no magic left.” Kell x Lila


Author's note:I wrote this on my phone when I was too lazy to focus on my history revision like the responsible person I am and I post this in hopes that someone who loves Kell and Lila as much as I do will find it somewhat soothing after the hole that this trilogy (whose characters and rights belong wholly to V. E Schwab) left in all our chests. I hope you enjoy it and please make my day by reviewing it and letting me know if you liked it or not.

Urs, _fanficninja205_

Sometimes, she would look at him when he lay next to her at night. She knew something was wrong and that he wasn't telling her but sometimes, she would look at the bags under his eyes and she would wonder what he had carried with him after they left London.

She was studying him now, the uneven rise and fall of his chest and the way his eyelids fluttered from whatever was plaguing him in his dreams. Lila knew what was going to happen in a few minutes and yet her heart jackhammered in her chest waiting for it. She closed her eyes and slowly turned her back to him.

One minute.

Two minutes

Three-

Kell let out a nearly inaudible gasp and she felt him shift next to her. Very gently, he stepped out of their shared bed and left the room taking his coat with him.

Her ship rocked gently on the waves and she would have gone back to sleep had this not been the thirteenth time of this occurrence. Kell and Lila had developed an unspoken bond and they both knew when the other wanted to talk and when they wanted to be left alone. So far she hadn't broken this bond, asking him what was wrong even though she could see him carry some invisible weight on his shoulders. She could see from the lines of his face that he was under some sort of physical pain that somehow couldn't let him sleep, but he hadn't ventured any information and she had been willing to give him time.

But patience- especially hers- had its limits. A year or so ago it would have been morbid curiosity but now she could feel concern sending her heart into a wild fit as she draped her own coat over her shoulders and exited her chambers. She had never followed him before, left him in his own privacy but now she sneaked quietly (what an irony, she thought, sneaking someone on her own ship) behind him and watched him lean against the rail, copper hair tousled and coat flailing in the wind.

Lila couldn't tell if he knew she was there, but when she came to stand next to or him, he didn't jerk back or look surprised. He simply turned to her and offered her one of his warm, gentle smiles. It was smaller than it used to be, but it didn't lack any of the emotion. Her heart lurched in her chest when she saw the ever-growing bags under his eyes but she forced it too still, mimic the sea's calm. Without saying a word, she raised her hand and traced her thumb over the bag under his black eye, identical to her own.

They stood there, wind dancing through them, rifling the fabric of their clothes, without saying a word, Lila carefully tracing her thumb over the tired lines or his face.

"Tell me."

He turned his face away from her then, but she placed her palm on his cheek and made him look in the eyes, black eye meeting black, brown eye meeting blue.

At last, he signed and placed his hand over her own, which was still on his left cheek and entwined their fingers.

"When Holland used the rings to use the Inheritor, he wrenched some of my magic and took it with him." Voice so soft, words so loud in the night's quiet and so very heavy on her chest as she imagined what came next.

"Every time I use my magic-" he paused and placed his forehead on hers, breath uneven matching the beating of her own heart.

"It hurts. It's a pain I've never know before. It gets worse every time and I don't have any control over it. And without my magic…" Lila kissed away a stray tear that was sliding on his face.

"Without your magic, you are still Kell. The brave, semi-responsible prince of Arnes. And you are still the man I tied to my bed in Grey London and forced to take me with him through hell and back. You are still you."

"Every time I use it, I hurt Rhy and remember I can never protect him as I used to without making him vulnerable. I am not what the allegiance of his kingdom thinks I am. If they learn I can't use it as I should… What if they attack Red London? What if I'm not strong enough to stop them? What if he relies on me and I let him down? My magic is what defines me as a person. It always has. _Antari_." He closed his eyes.

"if I didn't have my magic, would you have danced with me in the ball, followed me to the balcony? Would you have told me to come to your ship after all hell broke loose?" he looked at her then, and she knew what thoughts kept him up at night, stole him from her and what could be.

She hated herself at that moment. Because he was right, of course. If it hadn't been for his magic, he would have been insignificant, another royal to steal from, without any wonder and unspoken promises in the air around him.

But she loved him. And wasn't that enough?

Lila placed her arms around his neck and looked at him in the eye.

"Probably not. But thanks to you, my life changed in directions I never dared hope it would. You brought light to my dark, bleak life and I will be forever grateful for that. I don't know how to put words into heartwarming sentences like Rhy can or smile an oh-so-dazzling smile and make you forget your troubles like Alucard might be able to do but know this:" she swallowed and forced herself to look at him without blinking.

Everything inside her screamed _Run._

And she did.

She ran to him.

"I love you Kell Maresh, and I won't let you slip through my fingers and disappear in those horrible thoughts. I was a way worse person when you met me and I wouldn't have noticed you for what you were then when you look underneath all of the _Antari_ and found Kell. But now, thanks to you, I know better than to look at the outside only, she said, remembering the Gods damned black stone, and I would come to you again and again and again even when the world was ending and there was no magic left."

Had anyone from Lila's crew saw or heard them then, he would have thought it was impossible that Delilah Bard, ruthless captain of _The Night Spire_ could say words of love and have her tears mix with the ones of the most powerful living _Antari_, prince of Arnes as he lowered his face slowly and kissed her on the lips whispering "thank you" before closing the gap between them.

But then again, there was magic in the world. Impossibility is insubstantial until you learn to recognize the threads that can change life towards a calm sea and a clear sky.


End file.
